Archaeologica.org

Silly drivel ? Or one corner of something ? E.P . . . (?)

One of the things that seems to be almost ubiquitous with these ancient groups and their circles and mighty stone works . . . seems to be the fact that they all just “disappear” . . . writers go to great lengths explaining all sorts of possible scenarios: plague, war, climate, whatever. Global cataclysm is almost never proposed because it is too scary, and besides, the structures are intact for the most part. But, the single fact remains: the peoples associated with big piles of rocks or megalithic structures have a habit of disappearing.

That’s an unavoidable observation. Frank Joseph, who has been studying ancient sites in the U.S., their circles of which seem to bear resemblance to the more ancient sites, writes:

"What, then, was responsible for all the loosely connected ceremonial centers scattered from Wisconsin to Georgia [to Mexico, etc.] winding down at the same time? The answer is simple and comprehensively correct: a calendar."

One of the major elements in common among the various walled ceremonial centers was their concurrent function as astronomical observatories…

The people of Aztalan [the name of the Wisconsin ceremonial center as handed down orally by the local Native Americans] left their ceremonial enclosure, as did the inhabitants of the rest of the walled settlements throughout the Mississippi valley, because their sacred calendar ordered them to do so. Separated by great distances as they were, their alignment posts of sundial pyramids all told their observers the same thing at the same moment: it was time to go." (Joseph, 1997; emphasis added)

But, the single fact remains: the peoples associated with big piles of rocks or megalithic structures have a habit of disappearing.

Perhaps they just stop building big piles of rocks? The Egyptians stopped building pyramids without a catastrophe.

“Separated by great distances as they were, their alignment posts of sundial pyramids all told their observers the same thing at the same moment: it was time to go." “

Go to where?

Back to disappearences : a cut-&-paste (Warning : SOPHs ahead)

Some decades ago, certain natural scientists became intrigued by the problem and, concentrating on the Bronze Age collapses listed above, they realized that the range of evidence suggested natural causes rather than human actions (invasion, warfare). So, they all started talking about climate change, volcanic activity, and earthquakes. At present, these types of explanations are actually included in some of the standard historical accounts of the Bronze Age period, though many problems still remain: no single explanation appeared to account for all the evidence.

Immanuel Velikovsky upset everyone by suggesting that the Exodus — but only the Exodus — was caused by a bombardment of rocks, dust, carbons, and so on, as a result of Venus running amok in the Solar System. He collected an amazing assortment of myths and legends from around the world that strongly suggested that some sort of global cataclysm was being described, but when, where and how exactly it happened was rather iffy. There were others who wrote and talked about these matters before Velikovsky, including Ignatious Donnelly, who deserves an honorable mention for ascribing the myths to the Great Flood of Noah which he claimed was actually the destruction of Atlantis as described by Plato. Whether or not there was an advanced civilization known as Atlantis is not our concern here, but whether or not there was a flood, and when it may have occurred, is.

In the late 1970s, British astronomers Victor Clube and Bill Napier of Oxford University began investigating cometary impact as the ultimate cause. In 1980, Nobel Prize winning physicist Luis Alvarez and his colleagues published a paper in Science which argued that a cosmic impact is what led to the extinction of the dinosaurs. Alvarez’s paper had immense influence, though that influence acted in different ways on the two sides of the Atlantic. In the US, there is the “wishful thinking” school which posits that only asteroid impacts are significant and they are so rare that we don’t have to worry. In Britain, further research by astronomers Clube and Napier, Prof. Mark Bailey of the Armagh Observatory, Duncan Steel of Spaceguard Australia, and Britain’s best known astronomer Sir Fred Hoyle, all led to their support of the theory of cometary impact loosely termed the “British School of Coherent Catastrophism”.

According to Clube and Napier, et al., in the same way that Jupiter was struck repeatedly in 1994 by the million-megaton impacts of the comet Shoemaker-Levy, so Earth was bombarded 13,000 years ago by the fragments of a giant comet that broke up in the sky before the terrified eyes of humanity. The multiple impacts on the rotating planet caused tidal waves, raging fires, atomic bomb-like blasts, the mass extinction of many prehistoric species such as the mammoth and sabre-toothed tiger, most of humanity, and left the world in darkness for months. (See: The Cosmic Serpent and The Cosmic Winter by Clube and Napier. See also: “The Origin of the Universe and the Origin of Religion”, Anshen Transdisciplinary Lectureships in Art, Science, and the Philosophy of Culture by Fred Hoyle.)

Some American scientists are joining the Coherent Catastrophism group. Physicist Richard Firestone and geologists Allen West and Simon Warwick-Smith write in their book, The Cycle of Cosmic Catastrophes:

In 1990, Victor Clube, an astrophysicist, and Bill Napier, an astronomer, published The Cosmic Winter, a book in which they describe performing orbital analyses of several of the meteor showers that hit Earth every year. Using sophisticated computer software, they carefully looked backward for thousands of years, tracing the orbits of comets, asteroids, and meteor showers until they uncovered something astounding. Many meteor showers are related to one another, such as the Taurids, Perseids, Piscids, and Orionids. In addition, some very large cosmic objects are related: the comets Encke and Rudnicki, the asteroids Oljato, Hephaistos, and about 100 others. Every one of those 100-plus cosmic bodies is at least a half-mile in diameter and some are miles wide. And what do they have in common? According to those scientists, every one is the offspring of the same massive comet that first entered our system less than 20,000 years ago! Clube and Napier calculated that, to account for all the debris they found strewn throughout our solar system, the original comet had to have been enormous.

Clube and Napier also calculated that, because of subtle changes in the orbits of Earth and the remaining cosmic debris, Earth crosses through the densest part of the giant comet clouds about every 2,000 to 4,000 years. When we look at climate and ice-core records, we can see that pattern. For example, the iridium, helium-3, nitrate, ammonium, and other key measurements seem to rise and fall in tandem, producing noticeable peaks around 18,000, 16,000, 13,000, 9,000, 5,000, and 2,000 years ago. In that pattern of peaks every 2,000 to 4,000 years, we may be seeing the “calling cards” of the returning mega-comet.

Fortunately, the oldest peaks were the heaviest bombardments, and things have been getting quieter since then, as the remains of the comet break up into even smaller pieces. The danger is not past, however. Some of the remaining miles-wide pieces are big enough to do serious damage to our cities, climate, and global economy. Clube and Napier (1984) predicted that, in the year 2000 and continuing for 400 years, Earth would enter another dangerous time in which the planet’s changing orbit would bring us into a potential collision course with the densest parts of the clouds containing some very large debris. Twenty years after their prediction, we have just now moved into the danger zone. It is a widely accepted fact that some of those large objects are in Earth-crossing orbits at this very moment, and the only uncertainty is whether they will miss us, as is most likely, or whether they will crash into some part of our planet. (Firestone et al. 2006)

More SOPH-ery :

It was a warm, clear afternoon in the capital. The bustle of metropolitan commerce and tourism filled the streets. Small sailing vessels dotted the sheltered waters within sight of the government buildings, riding on a soft southerly breeze. The Sun sparkled on the gentle swells and wakes, lending a luminous glow to the poppies and tulips nodding in the parks along the water’s edge. All was in order.

But suddenly, the sky brightened as if with a second, more brilliant sun. A second set of shadows appeared; at first long and faint, they shortened and sharpened rapidly. A strange hissing, humming sound seemed to come from everywhere at once. Thousands craned their necks and looked upwards, searching the sky for the new Sun. Above them a tremendous white fireball blossomed, like the unfolding of a vast paper flower, but now blindingly bright. For several seconds the fierce fireball dominated the sky, shaming the Sun. The sky burned white-hot, then slowly faded through yellow and orange to a glowering copper-red. The awful hissing ceased. The onlookers, blinded by the flash, burned by its searing heat, covered their eyes and cringed in terror. Occupants of offices and apartments rushed to their windows, searching the sky for the source of the brilliant flare that had lit their rooms. A great blanket of turbulent, coppery cloud filled half the sky overhead. For a dozen heartbeats the city was awestruck, numbed and silent.

Then, without warning, a tremendous blast smote the city, knocking pedestrians to the ground. Shuttered doors and windows blew out; fences, walls, and roofs groaned and cracked. A shock wave raced across the city and its waterways, knocking sailboats flat in the water. A hot, sulfurous wind like an open door into hell, the breath of a cosmic ironmaker’s furnace, pressed downward from the sky, filled with the endless reverberation of invisible landslides. Then the hot breath slowed and paused; the normal breeze resumed with renewed vigor, and cool air blew across the city from the south. The sky overhead now faded to dark gray, then to a portentous black. A turbulent black cloud like a rumpled sheet seemed to descend from heaven. Fine black dust began to fall, slowly, gently, suspended and swirled by the breeze. For an hour or more the black dust fell, until, dissipated and dispersed by the breeze, the cloud faded from view.

Many thought it was the end of the world…

The above quote is a reconstruction of events in Constantinople, 472 CE, extracted from Rain of Iron and Ice by John S. Lewis.

http://cassiopaea.org/2011/02/10/the-wa ... es-part-2/

… those caught in the earth beneath the buildings were incinerated and sparks of fire appeared out of the air and burned everyone they struck like lightning. The surface of the earth boiled and foundations of buildings were struck by thunderbolts thrown up by the earthquakes and were burned to ashes by fire… It was a tremendous and incredible marvel with fire belching out rain, rain falling from tremendous furnaces, flames dissolving into showers… As a result, Antioch became desolate… In this terror up to 250,000 people perished. (Jeffreys et al.1986)

Analysis of tree rings shows that in 540 AD in different parts of the world, the climate changed. Temperatures dropped enough to hinder the growth of trees as widely dispersed as northern Europe, Siberia, western North America, and southern South America.

A search of historical records and mythical stories pointed to a disastrous visitation from the sky during the same period, it is claimed. There was one reference to a “comet in Gaul so vast that the whole sky seemed on fire” in 540—41.

According to legend, King Arthur died around this time, and Celtic myths associated with Arthur hinted at bright sky Gods and bolts of fire.

In the 530s, an unusual meteor shower was recorded by both Mediterranean and Chinese observers. Meteors are caused by the fine dust from comets burning up in the atmosphere. Furthermore, a team of astronomers from Armagh Observatory in Northern Ireland published research in 1990 which said the Earth would have been at risk from cometary bombardment between the years 400 and 600 AD. …

Famine followed the crop failures, and hard on its heels bubonic plague that swept across Europe in the mid-6th century.

… At this time, the Roman emperor Justinian was attempting to regenerate the decaying Roman empire. But the plan failed in 540 and was followed by the Dark Ages and the rise of Islam. (Boyd 1999)

…[W]ithin these last few years, it has been found that there is a great swarm of cosmic debris circulating in a potentially dangerous orbit, exactly intersecting the Earth’s orbit in June (and November) every few thousand years. More surprisingly, perhaps, it has been found that the evidence for these facts was in the past deliberately concealed. When the orbits exactly intersect, however, there is a greatly increased chance of penetrating the core of the swarm, a correspondingly enhanced flow of fireballs reaching the Earth, and a greatly raised perception that the end of the world is nigh. This perception is liable to arise at other times as well, whenever fresh debris is formed, but deep penetrations occurred during the fourth millennium BC, again during the first millennium BC, taking in at their close the time of Christ, and will likely take place yet again during the millennium to come.

In Europe, the millennium was finally dispensed with when an official “providential” view of the world was developed as a counter to ideas sustained during the Reformation. Indeed, to hold anything like a contrary view at this time became something of a heresy and those who were given to rabble-rousing for fear of the millennium were roundly condemned. To the extent that a cosmic winter and Armageddon have aspects in common, therefore, authoritarian outrage is nothing new.

… Enlightenment, of course, builds on the providential view and treats the cosmos as a harmless backdrop to human affairs, a view of the world which Academe now often regards as its business to uphold and to which the counter-reformed Church and State are only too glad to subscribe. Indeed, it appears that repeated cosmic stress — supernatural illuminations — have been deliberately programmed out of Christian theology and modern science, arguably the two most influential contributions of western civilization to the control and well-being of humanity.

As a result, we have now come to think of global catastrophe, whether through nuclear war, ozone holes, the greenhouse effect of whatever, as a prospect originating purely with ourselves; and because of this, because we are faced with “authorities” who never look higher than the rooftops, the likely impact of the cosmos figures hardly at all in national plans. …

… A great illusion of cosmic security thus envelops mankind, one that the “establishment” of Church, State and Academe do nothing to disturb. Persistence in such an illusion will do nothing to alleviate the next Dark Age when it arrives. But it is easily shattered: one simply has to look at the sky. The outrage, then, springs from a singularly myopic stance which may now place the human species a little higher than the ostrich, awaiting the fate of the dinosaur. (Clube & Napier 1990, 11—13)

Go to where?

On this subject, historian Thomas L. Thompson writes, with typical academic understatement:

"Each successive period – Early Bronze IV, Middle Bronze II/Late Bronze I, Iron I, and the early ‘Persian’ period – finds its fate in economic collapse and a dramatic Malthusian culling of the population. It is these periods that most require historical explanation, for these depressions are departures from the expected." (The Mythic Past [Perseus, 1999], p. 135)

http://cassiopaea.org/2011/12/04/the-cs ... y-is-bunk/

(PS : If you can overcome your aversion to Stinky Old Poopyheadery, that link is a nicely-done validation of E.P.'s Comet Danger awareness).